Here's another new project in the office, an addition to a residence on Capital Hill. The existing house is a tiny 750 sq. ft. bungalow on one of Seattle's steepest streets. The owners found the compact plan a perfect fit when they first moved in, but two kids later, they desperately need more room. They are drawn of the core values of modern architecture: emphasis on natural light, spaces that flow together, honest and straightforward materials and want a house that expresses that. They are comfortable making a pretty bold statement, but they also want the addition to feel comfortable in the existing fabric of the neighborhood. They are interested in sustainability that is designed in from the ground up, which led to the early decision to preserve the existing structure instead of starting from scratch on the site.

How to add onto an existing building that has a well-defined or historical style is a perennial architectural puzzle (and hip roofs are especially difficult to achieve seamless integration). In this case, we approached it by creating a clear contrast between the new and the old through form, material and color. But it's not enough to just plunk a contemporary form next to an old house and expect a real conversation to take place. In this addition, the new and old talk to each other both in how the volumes intersect and in how the two differing styles overlap.

Intersection Our early drawings all show a long, narrow addition running north-south to hold the downhill edge of the property. However, after looking at dozens of alternative schemes, we realized the potential for a very special outdoor space, between the south-facing wall of the addition, the steep hillside and the existing house. Private, yet with almost ideal sun exposure, this patio is the heart of the design but it sets up a tricky problem: we wanted to the public and private wings of the house to fit up against one another while at the same time creating a space between them.

In the rendering above, you can see how we resolved this conundrum: the charcoal-colored wall literally acts like a giant door, swinging out of the (blue) addition to carve space from the (yellow) existing house and define the courtyard. This dividing wall gets a different material and different detailing show a clear relationship between the planning and the way the house is actually made. Creating a courtyard at the joint between the new and old helps to differentiate the two volumes and separate the bedrooms from the public spaces. The slight angle of the addition's south wall also provides enough solar exposure so that a concrete trombe wall behind the south-facing glass is effective in reducing the use of conventional heating by about a third. (More on the passive solar design of this house in a later post)

Overlap While they are separated by their overall form, the old and new portions of the house are tied together by elements that extend the language of one style into the other portion of the house. The largest example of this is the secondary level of detailing we are developing for both structures. The large-scale metal sun canopy of the addition is repeated at a smaller scale as a canopy at the front entry and then inside the original house as a pair of room-divider screens that create separate zones within the loft-like space (and incidentally help act as shear walls).

The language of filtering light through parallel vertical columns even extends the site design: the wide sideyard on the west creates the perfect bamboo garden outside the kitchen's horizontal slot window and a verdant path to the courtyard.

In the fall, we started the design for a new house in Sand Point.  Although the project stalled here in schematic design, we were very excited about the work, and hopefully it will come back in some form (we recycle!).  Here are the three schematic designs we presented: Scheme 1:  PLUS

The clients wanted to have a 'permeable' house with soft transitions that welcomed neighbors but kept private space private.  The design delineated the corner site into 4 quadrants with varying degrees of privacy.  A manicured garden graces the stepped path from the very public corner, while the upper drive on the southwest provides the day to day family entrance (at grade for the client's aging parents.  One the northeast, a wide terrace off the living spaces provides a great entertaining space that opens to the more quiet neighborhood edge.  The two volumes of the plus create a very private backyard on the southeast.

The house has a very clean organization--living spaces are lined up in the lower volume, each with access to the eastern terrace/backyard, with the bedrooms stretched across the second story volume.  The second story volume bridges over the first story, bookended with a mudroom and a semi-detached mother-in-law, creating two apertures--one for the entry, the second for an covered outdoor living room.  At the intersection of the two volumes we have an atrium with a sculptural stair.

Scheme 2:  HINGE

The second scheme is also addresses the clients' concerns about overwhelming the street, creating a private backyard, and blurring the edge between garden and house.  The design features a low slung wood and glass box with a broad, planar green roof along the west edge of the site.  A two story box, following the north site edge, contains the living room, media room and mother-in-law on the main floor, with bedrooms and a double studio/playroom above.

If the first scheme is PLUS, this one probably should have been nicknamed 'minus' because the overlap of the two volumes is subtracted to make a dramatic vertical space where the geometries interact.  In the morning, light floods the kitchen.  In the evening, the screened/glass wall on the western wall of the second story filters through to the living room:

Scheme 3:  WING

The central idea of the WING scheme is two volumes--one private, one public--connected by a glass skinned entry, under a big angular roof.  Again we're reinforcing the site's geometry to vary the degrees of privacy and expand the livable space of the house beyond the envelope with a series of outdoor spaces each with a unique character and function.  At the corner, a terrace defined with a low seat wall, is the place for after dinner drinks, sunsets, and engaging with the neighbors. Toward the backyard, we have a perfect spot for baking in the summer sun, and a outdoor hangout/informal dining space with fireplace adjacent to the kitchen.

Of the three options, the clients' preference was PLUS.  It has the strongest volumetric presence, an elemental simplicity and it handled the site issues and their program with sophistication and subtlety.

We are very excited to begin a new project for the Sunset Hill neighborhood to transform an abandoned City Light substation parcel into a pocket park.  Based on the input from the community thus far, the program is very intriguing:  a community space with an artist-in-residence caretaker, powered by a serious photovoltaic array. There may be more or different elements as the project evolves in the community design process, and as we navigate through various City agencies and funding sources, but fundamentally this has all the values we expound as a firm:  sustainable building, energized public space, housing options/density, and  an interactive process that invests people in the civic life of their neighborhood.

In 2008, I designed a structure with a similar program for a Dwell Magazine conceptual competition:

Set at the east end of Crissy Field in San Francisco, this Community Room/Exhibit Hall creates an anchor for a new sculpture park. The hall is a multipurpose space, more infrastructure than building--for public events, private events, exhibits, etc. The glass sliding panels open the hall to the public, the park and the views of the Golden Gate Bridge.

A small caretaker's residence is situated on the second floor, using the broad roof of the Community Room as a vegetable garden, eliminating the conflict between the public park and the private residence. The glass screen walls provides security, and electricity--the design on the glass is created with a photovoltaic interlayer, which powers the house and hall. Stormwater is captured, stored and used to irrigate the roof garden.

While this little conceptual project may help to inform the Sunset Substation, I'm excited to apply some of this experience in designing a real world pocket park.

Stay tuned....

We've completed the first round of design on our CAST architecture case study backyard cottage.

Kate and Ric's cottage is intended to serve as an art studio, workshop and guest house. It is also designed so that it may function as a rental home if needed. Our initial round of planning looked at how the spaces might work as a rental thinking that those functional requirements would be more restrictive than the requirements for an art studio and workshop.

Elements common to all three schematic design options:

All three options place the cottage at the SW corner of the site, chosen for it's relationship to the more public areas of the existing home and for an opportunity to create a shared outdoor room for both the cottage and the home. They all have a gable roof which was chosen for the height bonus allowed in the ordnance and to help marry the form of the cottage to the form of the existing home. All three options have the kitchen, living and bath rooms on the first floor and a bedroom loft on the second floor. Another feature common to all the options is the use of salvaged galvanized steel scaffolding components (see image below) which we plan to use as treads for ladder to the loft spaces.

---

SCHEMATIC DESIGN OPTION 1

---

This design incorporates an existing garage which more or less sits on the South and West property lines. The city land use desk (walk in) indicated that it was probable that we would be able to grandfather the building envelope of the existing garage into a new backyard cottage but they were unwilling to guarantee it. They recommended that we go through formal land use approval early in the process. Regardless of their final call we did know that we would have to stick within the building envelope of the garage for all portions of the backyard cottage that did not conform to the new ordinance. The potential advantage of using the existing garage is that it would allow us to use up less of the yard space for our new structure.

This drawing illustrates the site plan and floor plans. The existing garage is the portion of the structure that bumps out to the south and the west.

This is a view of the cottage from the SE. You can see the envelope of the existing garage on the south side of the structure.

A view from the NE looking through the shared outdoor room.

A view looking from the dining room, past the scaffolding ladder and into the living area.

A view from the living room into a private shade garden inspired by small Japanese courtyard gardens and created in the 5' setback from the lot line. a four foot concrete wall and cedar fence above create a very private and intimate indoor/outdoor space.

A view from the street.

---

SCHEMATIC DESIGN OPTION 2

---

The major element in this design is the creation of a covered outdoor workspace to the south of the cottage.

The covered patio to the south provides a sheltered outdoor workspace. The loft space is pulled back from the east wall allowing two stories of light to fill the first floor studio.

View from the SE

View from the NE

Loft space

---

SCHEMATIC DESIGN OPTION 3

---

This scheme ended up being the winner with Kate and Ric. They felt it was the best fit for their needs in terms of layout and size. It features a simple open plan on the first floor and a second floor that is more private than the lofts in the first two options.

Pass through doors and a simple plan define this scheme.

View from the SE.

View from the NE.

Entry from shared outdoor room

Looking toward the kitchen and dining room.

Bath with a private shade garden.

Loft.

We can't seem to get enough of Seattle's new citywide backyard cottage ordinance...

In addition to the two custom solutions we are currently working on we've also started up plans for a prefabricated backyard cottage. Designed to be trucked to your home and assembled in minimal time, this compact home is your ticket to instant gratification. If you are looking for a space to make art, stash guests on extended stays or earn a little rental income - look no further...

The first floor features the living, kitchen and dining rooms as well as a bed and bath. A double height space over the living room and a portion of the dining room brings light deep into the interior and provides a feeling of spaciousness.

The second story loft looks out over the living and dining rooms and has space for an office, a guest bed and overflow storage.

The cottage is designed to ship on a single semi and assembled in minimal time. We're currently working with a regional manufacturer and a local builder to see if we can get the price point to come in under what you would pay for a similar site built structure... Send us an email or give us a call if you would like us to keep you posted.

We are very excited to see this survey of Seattle's urban community gardens, especially since the Interbay P-Patch is included as one of the case studies.  The P-Patch is one of my personal favorites because of the impact it has had in strengthening this vital community, and has been instrumental in showing other neighborhoods how to implement their own community garden.

Further, the P-Patch really showed us just how satisfying working on these small pro bono projects can be. Since the P-Patch, we'll donated about 5% of our yearly output to pro bono causes, including daycares, parks, and community centers and hope that we'll have more opportunities to help concerned citizen groups visualize and build a better city.

Our installation just got linked on the Stranger's SLOG.

We have been working on a house remodel in Sammamish for the last year and a half and it is finally closing in on completion, so I fiqured I post some construction photos from my site visit this morning.  One my favorite elements is a screen porch off the dining room, partially because it is a great example of the client's vital participation in the process, and part because it is going to be such a wonderful place to hang out.  The screen porch was born in programming when we were discussing how half the family loved hanging out outdoors, but the other half hated the bugs.  In order to keep the family together, the screen porch was the simple solution.  Connected to the dining room via a large panel siding door, framed with care so that the structure is all exposed, it cuts to the soul of the house they wanted:  engaged with the outdoors, family-centric, with a elegant simplicity that highlighted the materials and craft. Next summer: the landscaping with a stairway that bridges across a simple water feature.

The family room is also starting to come together.  The room has a band of 6' windows that wrap around three walls with bench seats below, a slate fireplace, and a coffered ceiling.  The bench seats will have leather cushions and storage underneath for games etc, making it the perfect cozy hang out spot.

We are working on a collaborative art installation for the Nord Building's upcoming Alley Party, sponsored by two non-profits, Feet First and the International Sustainability Institute.

Feet First is an advocate for walkable communities, and ISI works on documenting global best practices for urban sustainability.  They have been working with their neighbors to transform alleys from nuisances to assets. Part of the program to invigorate the alleys as a vibrant urban places is their Alley Parties.  Each one incorporates art, music, food and drink to draw people into the alley and give people a different perspective on what they can become.

This Thursday, CAST, in collaboration with Christopher Ezzell of E Workshop, and Vashon Island artist Shahreyar Ataie,  will open an art installation that will float over their the Nord Building's section of alley, using about 600 recycled 2 liter bottles.   It will be up through the New Year.

So come one and all!  Did I mention there will be food, drink and music?

Alley between 1st and Second, just South of Occidential Park

314 First Avenue

November 3rd,  from 5 pm to 9 pm

Greenwood resident Kate Lichtenstein contacted us last spring to help her design a backyard studio / guest house for her modest 650 square foot 1920's one bedroom home (shown above). While the home's scale fits nicely with Kate's desire to have a simple and ecologically responsible lifestyle it falls a little short when it comes to a rough and ready workshop space for art, bicycle repair, ski tuning and building projects. Kate's home also lacks the space for a home office / guest room - something that she would like to integrate into the new structure.

Our initial goal was to have her project under construction by late summer 2009 but we were unable to get the project off the ground by that time. In hindsight, the stalling of the project turned out to be a stroke of luck...

In March of 2009 Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels proposed legislation that would allow Seattle homeowners to construct backyard cottages on their property. The legislation was reviewed and ultimately passed by the Seattle city council on November 2nd 2009 (with a 9 to 0 vote too! Kudos to Seattle voters for electing progressive urbanists for city council members!).

For Kate the ordinance has opened up new possibilities for a structure that can both accommodate her current needs and provide a potential source of income as a rental unit if her finances ever fall on hard times. Besides allowing for a legal detached rental unit the ordinance also allows for the construction of a two story structure – an arrangement that will work well for Kate’s needs and will help to preserve the spaciousness of her backyard.

Kate is planning to build with a mind toward sustainability and has a special interest in using recycled building materials whenever possible (she is, at this time, planning to write a parallel blog on the topic of recycled building materials). For us at CAST architecture Kate's project is an exciting chance to test out the new backyard cottage ordinance and work with a client who is committed to building green. We see her project as an excellent opportunity to provide the general public with information about the process of designing and building a backyard cottage in Seattle. Kate and her partner Ric Cochrane are always game for an adventure and have graciously agreed to allow us to share their experience with you. To that end, we are planning to blog about Kate's project as we travel through the design and construction process. Please subscribe to our feed if you would like to follow along in future posts…